The Shock of Arrival: Reflections on Postcolonial ExperienceSouth End Press, 1996 - 223 pages In this book, acclaimed South Asian American poet and novelist Meena Alexander unleashes a fury of prose and poetry to confront the stereotypes and explore the challenges facing postcolonial immigrants in America. Commenting on the history of memory, language, shame, and exile, Alexander poignantly describes the wealth of experiences and imaginings that have shaped her life and writing. Her project: "to make space for what was crossed out in the decorum of femininity, in the high places of classical hierarchy, in the racism of a canonical knowledge, in the obliterations of a national memory ... all this is part of our task, part of the violent, fractured worlds that we must etch into beauty". |
From inside the book
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Page 27
... " House of a Thousand Doors , " the title poem of a book I published in 1988 , is a dream poem . The house rises up in the pure space of the mind , as a dream might Whose House is This ? 27 Whose House is This? House of a Thousand Doors.
... " House of a Thousand Doors , " the title poem of a book I published in 1988 , is a dream poem . The house rises up in the pure space of the mind , as a dream might Whose House is This ? 27 Whose House is This? House of a Thousand Doors.
Page 50
... published it . My only other experience with performance was " Night- Scene , the Garden . " Though written as a poem , it was performed Off - Off - Broadway by the Medicine Show Theatre Ensemble as part of their Spring 1989 series . I ...
... published it . My only other experience with performance was " Night- Scene , the Garden . " Though written as a poem , it was performed Off - Off - Broadway by the Medicine Show Theatre Ensemble as part of their Spring 1989 series . I ...
Page 215
... published in Women and Performance , double issue on " New Hy- brid Identities , " vol . 7 , no . 2 / vol . 8 , no . 1 ( 1995 ) : 14-15 , 29-37 . An earlier version of " In Search of Sarojini Naidu " was published in Economic and ...
... published in Women and Performance , double issue on " New Hy- brid Identities , " vol . 7 , no . 2 / vol . 8 , no . 1 ( 1995 ) : 14-15 , 29-37 . An earlier version of " In Search of Sarojini Naidu " was published in Economic and ...
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aesthetic America artist Ashtamudi Lake Asian Asian-American art Balamaniamma bits blood born breath British burning child cloth colonialism cried culture dance dark death decolonization Delhi dharma Draupadi dream earth edge English eyes face feminine fierce figure filled fire flesh forced Frantz Fanon Gandhi garden girl hair hands Hashmi head Hyderabad imagination India Kathakali Kerala Khartoum Lalithambika language light lines living Malayalam maternal Meena Alexander memory mother mouth Native American never painted Parasurama passion poem poet poetry political postcolonial published river rock Safdar Hashmi San Andreas Fault sari Sarojini Naidu sense sexual shock of arrival Sita skin Skin Song snow Song soul space speak speech stone street struggle tell Tethi Thankam things thought tion Tiruvella tongue torn trees turned Vasco da Gama violence voice walking wall window woman words writing young